Centre for Public Policy Research (CPPR) is a think tank dedicated to intensive research on economic, social, and political issues.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Garbage and queen of Arabian Sea

As the traffic blockades continue in cochin city, the industrial capital of God's own country is in the newsheadlines for a wrong reason; piling garbage. The city has been growing ever since the state formation and it is the only city in Kerala which has a true cosmopolitian atmosphere. the population in city is more than 2 million and it has been home from Jews to Sikhs. The city contributed much to the state GDP.

today, Cochin has been rated potential IT city. Smart cities and IT parks have slowly started descending down to the shores of Arabian sea. but the city admisnistration is neither smart enough to tackle the issues like grabgae disposal. The city corporation has been ruled by people lacking vision and mission on this subject. during the last one decade, the garbage issue grown out of propotions but there has no realisitic approach from the administration. whenver the court smelled foul or bitten by mosquitoes, the corporation received the admonishment from the High Court. for the next few days, corporation slug out all its machinery to save its face. this has been the norm for the last many years.

this monsoon worsened the situation. there are reports corruption and bribe on the part of officials and the party leaders added misery to the city life. another day, another foul smell opened the eyes of judiciary and luckily for the city dwellers. The city does not have any vacant space nor any recycling plants. the city adminstration bought land in the suburbs for building the recyling plant has been a forgotten event for many officials. to save thier seats they have to act; solution: why should we waste time and money for a recycling plant; instead we can simply dump the garbage there itself. can we call it ' State sponsored vandalism?' anyway, at the end f the day, they have retract at the fury of the locals. now they found another place; udayamperoor. reports suggest that the they have to find another place soon........ how long can this thamasha go on?

can we blame the city adminstrators alone? yes we agree that they failed in their vision. but that is the plight of this God's own country. at the same time, are we lacking civic sense? why can't be corporation be a facilitator and monitoring agency instead of implementing agency? encourage and facilitate the resident associations to come up with thier own plans and solve the garbage issue at the ground level. it shall be the responsibilty to separate the different types of wastes and then hand over to the RWA run recycling plants. in an ever growing city like cochin, most of these issues can be solved with truly decentralised planning and administration. for this to happen, political parties have to bend their minds to equip themselves to facilitate the working of RWAs. unfortunately, their minds are also piled with grabage

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Kochi - traffic blocks................. never ending

this is a sad commentary on the affairs in the city of cochin. City is notorious for the traffic blocks. there is no proper traffic system in the city. All the traffic signals, which of course is a obsolete in the traffic map, are famous for its 15 seconds green pasture. My personal experience outside taught me a lesson that the green light shall be on for at least 90 seconds to clear one end of the road before the signal switches over to the other ends. here in cochin, each time when the green signal is on, it provides only max 15 to 20 seconds for the vehicles to cross the junction.it eventually ends up with more traffic blocks and more fuel consumption. science text books in school classes teaches us that any engine accelerates consumes more energy to reach the steady state. Cochin is an apt place to demonstrate this phenomenon.

is there any standard road in cochin or any road can be called as road built for vehicle movement. all the roads are known for death knells and gutters. it slows down the vehicle movement and thus ends in traffic blocks. but who cares? another day when the movement of any high court judge is affected, let us hope there will be an improvement.

calculate the loss of time and most significantly, the loss of lives. if the roads are repaired and widened, how much time we can save. where does the money go allotted for the repairing works of the roads? no one is bothered much. is it because of the cynicism that has become a part of social life of Kerala?

Sunday, July 01, 2007

Kerala - leading to a disaster?

Recent developments in Kerala lead to many disturbing thoughts in my mind. Each day cannot pass without acknowledging the beaming headlines of corruption and vandalism. To make it worse, in most of these acts the state is involved in one way or another. There seems to be no end to this series of stories appearing everyday. Most of the political party leaders are throwing stones each other on the corrupt practices that they are indulged into and reported by media in order to save their face value. Kerala, having high penetration of media sources, exemplifies how the state is run under the murky dealings of a few individuals. Now onwards, it is accepted in Kerala that even the bribe and corruption are legalised provided that monetary transaction involved in the whole deal is retunred to both parties with market defined interest rates!!!!!!!!!! State sponsors corrupt practices that is rampant in Kerala society.

Other major issue is the increaasig motor accidents in Kerala. Everyday not less than ten individuals lose their lives in the gutters and potholes of Kerala. No one gives value to the life and the significance of time. Traffic blocks are the order of the day. Malayali learns the lessons of patience sitting in the public trnasport. why? State sponsored malpractices in the construction and repairing works of roads and neglignece in the maintenance and support part.

Garbage issue is another one. All the local bodies find it difficult to find place to dump the garbage collection. reason:the lack of vision on the future and negligence. Again state is under threat as a result of state sponsored whmisical attitude of the rulers.

Whethere these developments lead to a situation of total anarchy in the state? can we see a comparison of total collapse of the state as the world witnessed at other parts of the globe one decade back. are we heading to a public audit where the citizens lose their patience and throw away the exisiting systems and believes?